It is heretofore been the practice in gaseous fueled barbeque grills of the type using, for example, natural or LP gas, to incorporate Bunsen-type burners below the food supporting grills or grates within the grill housings. Such Bunsen-type burners have been found to operate satisfactory; however, because such large quantites of excess air is required for combustion in Bunsen-type burners, considerable fuel is consummed in heating barbeque grills that utilize the same.
In order to provide a gas fired or fueled barbeque grill which operates more efficiently than those employing Bunsen burners, it has heretofore been proposed to utilize an infra-red or flameless incandescent burner unit within the grill, Such infra-red burner appliances have been found to use significantly less gas in producing the same effective heat output as conventional Bunsen-type burner appliances. Infra-red burner units have the additional advantage that objects can be heated relatively fast; however, the infra-red burner units heretofore known and used have been objectionable from the standpoint that they do not provide for uniform heating over an entire cooking grill or grate and that they have been located above, as opposed to below the food supporting grate. The latter mentioned objection is considered to be serious in that the food drippings do not get burned to provide the smoke that flavors the food being cooked when the burner unit is located above the food. With regard to the former objection, infra-red burner units to date, while providing a greater amount of heat than the comparable Bunsen-type burners, such heat is concentrated in a relatively small area, and accordingly, when a large barbeque grate is to be heated, it is necessary to use two or more complete burners, with each burner having its own gas supply and ancillary control valve.
The present invention is intended to provide a new and improved barbeque grill of the above described type which overcomes the various objectionable characteristics of both Bunsen and infra-red type burner units that have been utilized in the past. More particularly, the present invention provides a novel barbeque grill assembly featuring an improved infra-red burner unit which is intended to provide a large heating area below the food supporting grate and yet minimize fuel consumption to the extreme. The burner unit incorporated in the barbeque grill of the present invention consists of a plurality of spaced apart burner elements, each of which when provided with an ignited mixture of gaseous fuel and air provides a flameless incandescent heating area, with the areas being so located as to provide a large cooking area. An optional layer of a rock-like material may be disposed between the plurality of burner elements and the food supporting grate, which material becomes heated and causes combustion of any food drippings so as to produce smoke for flavoring the food being cooked.